People look at me now and they assume I've always looked this way. I'm not "fat", I'm not overtly huge and I am obviously an active person. I speak fitness, live fitness and love fitness. People assume that that has always been the case.

Most of you will know that I'm on a weight loss journey. My journey started over two years ago, it's been a long time and it's easy to forget where we came from.

Most of the people in my life now have never seen me larger than a UK size 10-12. In fact, I hid away for a long time because of what I'd done to my body. I could never accept it, the way it looked or felt. The way I sweated when I walked for even the shortest time. The way I was unhappy every time I caught a glimpse of myself in a reflective surface.

I came out of hiding when I made the decision to change my life. It was hard. People mocked me - people in cars passing me by would shout out at me running along the road. Usually it was something along the lines of "run fatty". Sometimes though, it was "keep going". Which goes to show - people come in all varieties. That was something I never accepted for myself.

I've talked about the times I locked myself away, I hid and was miserable - waiting for a magical existence to sweep me away. Or for my miserable existence to end. This isn't that. This is a celebration of everything I have achieved.

You see me now and you assume that I'm happy with my body. A few months ago, someone said to me "but you'd never understand, you're not fat". Ah, the beauty of appearances. The willful acceptance of the mind to assume what it can see.

I haven't always looked the way I look now and today I've decided to do something I've been terrified to do. I'm sharing that journey. I take progress photos regularly, but my last were taken in July and I've held off sharing them until now.

There are few photos of me at my largest of 200Ibs. The one below was the first photo I took when I began to take back control of my life - I was 175Ibs and finally starting to accept what I saw and know I could change it.

I've waited for months, waiting to meet goals, waiting to meet my ultimate weight goal but you know what? I'm proud of what I've achieved and I started to lose sight of that. So, here is my "Transformation Tuesday" offering.

For those new friends who never suspected where I was before, or for the ones who have heard the tales but have never seen the evidence. This is my journey so far....

January 2012: 175Ibs45.3% body fatUK size 16-18

July 2014:154Ibs24% body fat (approx)UK size 10-12

Scuse the silly faces, they're the best I can manage :p

I still have a way to go - ideally I'd like to sit 130-140Ibs range with 17-18% body fat and this is a reminder to me of that commitment I made all that time ago.

Do you have a #transformation Tuesday story to share? Where did you start? Where are you now? Are you still "travelling" (as it were)? And if you are - how far do you still have to go?

It's true. If Friday had a face, this is totally what it would look like.

I don't have much else to say today - it's been a VERY long term and I. AM. POOPED! I've been sort of AWOL - I hope you've all been ok? This term has been very busy, with some ups and some downs. Some amazing things and some "oh crap what have I got into" things, but it's done with now. Now I can sleep, rest and get ready to do it all again ;) I'll update you more on everything soon, but I'm ready to sit and watch some TV....So, this is going to be a short post but you know what?

I have TOTALLY

I woke up this morning and decided that today was a good day. Don't get me wrong, I didn't want to wake up, but when I did, I decided to have some fun today :D

So, what made me feel good this Friday?

Well....you might remember this....

This was taken on July 9th and I could hold it for maybe two seconds....

Tonight, to celebrate my 80th day of the yoga streak I committed myself to I finally held Crow Pose (Kakasana) for 45 seconds!! Whoooo :D

Feet properly up and knees higher on my arms - just to straighten those arms now into Crane pose!!

On top of that today I got to see my little sister, have a very nice coffee and do some great yoga! I even managed to run my 5k in 35 minutes :D

I don't have much to add to this. This is what I believe about choice. I believe that you need to love yourself enough to accept that you ALWAYS have a choice. Whether you're at the top of that rope or whether you're dangling there at the bottom waiting to climb up.

I know I have the power to change my circumstances and I know that I choose to feel the way I feel but sometimes getting a grip on things can be difficult.

Sometimes it's just a case of hanging on at the end of your rope until things start to look a little better, until you can start to make that climb back up, until you have the strength to pull yourself together and get moving.

I'm not there yet. I'm dangling, balancing things very carefully, grateful for these strong shoulders that I've grown over the past few years. Shoulders that can handle the burden and that are strong enough to keep me just hanging on.

Sometimes that's the best we can hope for. To accept our current situation and be grateful for the strength that we have to keep our head above water, or, to follow our analogy, to keep hold of that rope. To know things will get better.

Today was no exception to the harsh treatment I have subjected myself to and there is only ever ONE cure for me, to help me move on and to assess my situation and today it looked a bit like this...

Yeah, guess what numpty got caught in the rain....

Well. That's a misleading statement. I actually knew it was going to rain when I left the house. In fact, it was raining very lightly as I stepped out but I love running in the rain anyway and I assumed it would stop. Wrong.

5 minutes into my run every time I blinked I sent water cascading down my face and my arms were dripping. 10 minutes in and I'd spit on my glasses....don't judge me, I prefer to have spitty glasses and be able to see :p

But still, 38 minutes later I got home. Not too shabby, still working on a continuous run rather than speed (as you can probably tell by that time....) and I succeeded - a full 5k of running. Yay!

On top of that, I felt AMAZING! How many of you guys leave the house feeling a little (or maybe a lot) sorry for yourself, sometimes even like you don't want to go out and run, yet when you get home you could tap-dance all the way to the shower?

Well, that was me today. Exercise, as I'm sure I've said before is my escape.

Exercise always reminds me of how far I've come from being that big girl who got stuck in her own, miserable world. It always reminds me of the human propensity to surpass ones expectations and it ALWAYS surprises me.

Exercise reminds me to be fearless and it reminds me that I, we, you are stronger than you'd ever imagine.

Now as I'm sure you're aware, last night was pole night. Nothing can touch pole night. Pole night is the night of the week I get to leave everything behind and be that fearless person on the pole.

I always have to remind myself to be fearless. I'm far from fearless, but I think that doing the things that scare you is actually more important than never being scared of anything. This week was just that week. Now, as I said last week, Karen discovered that I cannot do a decent Butterfly.

Butterfly scares the crap out of me. Excuse the language. But it does. I have no idea why - it was one of the first things we were taught to do and it's perfectly simple, but I'd rather spend the night ankle releasing (which hurts like the seven circles of hell being pressed into your inner thighs....) than do a Butterfly.

So last night, I got to do Butterflys. Lots of them. I got to do them until I managed this....

Apparently it could do with some work, but it "would do" for the night. *wipes brow*

I then spent the rest of evening practising ankle release. Remember, sometimes you get what you wish for....

An hour of pole wasn't enough for sure! I managed to get a decent hold on the ankle release, but being able to right myself is not something I'm quite able to do yet....it involved Karen standing underneath me pushing with her knees and pulling my shoulders to try and get me upright. So glam ;) And I did NOT put my hands on the floor. I promise (because if I put my hands on the floor I'd take the weight off my legs....yes, I promise I was listening Karen ;) ).

Tom got to finally practice his Caterpillar....yes, I did tell Karen about that in return for the Butterfly saga :p A move that looks fairly simple is a devil of a thing to do. Wowee. I got down from the pole feeling like I'd run a mile! We also got into lots of trouble. Apparently Tom's monkey feet are NOT allowed on the pole and somehow, Tom's monkey feet being on the pole meant I got to practice climbing. Still, I do need the practice...!

I left pole last night exhausted. In a good way of course. Most of all, what I left with was that knowledge...Yep, doing things that scare you is much more important than never being scared.

What things do you find yourself doing even though they scare you (just a little)?

Today was legs day. It wasn't just any legs day though, it was my first legs day in about a month.

I walked into the gym, straight to the weights section and the most lovely sight in the world greeted me. Gym goers, you'll know of this beautiful sight....a free power rack, with a full complement of weights, a free bench and a free workout mat. Bliss!

I upped the weights to my current easy cruising weight of +30kg and suddenly the month off and the 5 warm up sets caught up with me. Ouch! Still, I pushed on a little, knowing at this point I'd regret it and added another +5kg. What I didn't realise was how quickly I'd come to regret this decision....

Finishing up the squats, tidying away my legs started that jelly feeling. Humm.

Lunges and Tri-dips went smoothly, until we hit the hamstring curls. The final set of hamstring curls and I made the mistake of laying (front down) on the bench after finishing the set.

I knew I had to get back up but it seemed like such a big, unimportant thing, so I laid there for a little while until I plucked up the energy to roll off of the bench sideways, drag my other leg off and roll my hips so I was sat on my butt on the floor and then roll up to standing using the bench and the strength I had in my arms to help....

Can't say it was my most dignified moment in the gym. Still, I'm sure I've had worse.....flashing people has to come above rolling around on the floor trying to get up....right? ;)

The final sets of barbell hip thrusts, deadlifts and leg raises took a little longer than one might expect but I left the gym striding on cloud 9. It felt amazing. I was drenched in sweat, smiling like a madwoman and feeling like superwoman.

Then I sat down. Ah. Driving home was made much more interesting by the requirement of using the clutch. I got stopped at a red light and had to fight an inner battle not to just let the clutch go and hell be with whatever happened next.

Still, I made it home. Now, I'm sure that living on the first floor seemed like a GREAT idea when we moved in, but today it seemed like a personal challenge. I have to confess that more than once whilst climbing the stairs to our apartment I was very tempted to sit on the stairs outside my flat and call Simon using my mobile to come and get me....still, I have some pride, so I crawled those last steps and made it to the flat alone ;)

Anyway, a hot bath, lots of water, a protein shake and some gentle yoga later I am now sat down with zero chance of wanting to get back up. What I'm most impressed by though is the amazing sense of release I've had by getting back to the gym, almost like when you've been clutching something for ages without realising it. I find nothing more cathartic than focusing only on making my body push through lifting more than it ever could and paying that debt in sweat. What is your most cathartic moment in your routine?

Well. All I'm left with is - What a workout - I always think you can measure a good workout by how much driving home challenges you....that and how sweaty you are. Anything below positively amphibious needs reviewing ;) What marks a good workout for you?

So. I took myself off for a run for the first time in about a month just now.

It took me 50 minutes to do 5k, but I did it.

50 minutes? You might say.

50 minutes.

It all started off well enough. I set a nice easy pace for myself that didn't have me panting, but holding a conversation would have been tough. All well and good. My trousers fell down a little, I hopped along trying to pull them up. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Not until THAT stretch.

I'm sure you've experienced "that" stretch of road or trail. That stretch on your regular running route that always makes you think "life will be so much better when I get past here". Well, my stretch for road runs is a long, straight, slightly downhill stretch of pavement. Innocous, you might say. Boring, I would reply!

Anyway. I hit that stretch and it happened. It hasn't happened in years but it happened tonight. I got a stitch. I thought it'd been brewing for a while, but I'd shrugged it off and kept running, but now the stitch hit me. I carried on.

It took a while and several grimaces, but I'd run through the stitch. My first time ever! I felt smug. Aaha. Stitch: 0, me: 1.

There is, however, a good reason gloating is a stupid thing to do.

I got to the latter part of "that" stretch and BOOM. The stitch hadn't GONE it had ninjaed itself to a different place. My nemesis place - that bit under your ribs that makes breathing feel like you're sticking a pen in between your ribs and twisting.

This wasn't good.

So I tried the technique I used before: breathe shallow but even, slow the pace, breathe in through nose and out through mouth.

Nope, not having it.

It took about 2 minutes, but eventually the stitch won. I had to break pace and bend over to catch my breath. Luckily this was in an avenue of trees, so no one saw. Stitch: 1, me: 1.

I breathed for a moment and decided to carry on. About 30 seconds later, just as I'm getting to a busy part of my route the stitch comes back, full force. "Carry on and keep smiling" I think. About 15 seconds later, I was bent over double on the side of the road, clutching my ribs, grimacing like I was sat on a hedgehog and breathing like I was in labour.

Naturally at this point there had to be a sudden flow of traffic and pedestrians. One lady stopped and asked if I was ok, with that worried sort of look - the "please don't be dying here on me" look. I smiled, thanked her and told her I was fine. She looked at me like I'd gone slightly mad, but carried on. I have to say, I was touched she stopped and asked - there are some lovely people still around :)

Having made enough of a fuss I decided to move on, still grimacing and breathing like a pregnant hippo, but I was a MOVING pregnant hippo.

Stitch: 2, me: 1.

When I started running again I decided I would MENTALLY break the stitch. So i changed to an awesome song and started bopping along in time. I was on a busy road, so I decided to smile and look like I was having an awesome time. Then it got me again.

What do you do when you have a stitch on a busy road and don't want to look like you're just unfit? Well. I can assure you that the melodramatic portrayal of "dying runner" for the benefit of the passing cars did NOT help. I had to suck it up and look unfit....

49 minutes after I set out, I turned onto the road I live on and started my cooldown. Being FREEZING here at the moment I have to say, I'm pretty cool now....

Stitches have been my number one problem for a long time now, I have no idea to handle them. For the minor stitches in my lower obliques, I have decided the following advice is sound:

slow down, breathe shallow but consistently, relax the shoulders and chest, and keep an even pace.

For the big stitches that feel like you're dying....I have no idea! How do you guys deal with stitches?

Anyway, it's been awesome getting back into the routine of working out. I've been careful with this shoulder but all of a sudden I felt ready and raring to go - yesterday I took a well earned rest day, but Tuesday. Oh Tuesday. Pole night.

What a night.

I was eager to get to pole this week. More so than usual. It's been a while with my injury, 3 weeks in total and this week, all of a sudden I felt READY to use this shoulder and GET GOING!

Karen (who abandoned us last week!) of course was all for this. So, last pole consisted of a transition from Genevieve to Gold Rush - like in the pictures (I do have a picture of me doing Gold Rush but there is NO WAY I'm sharing it....I have my tummy out....)

Genevieve

Gold Rush (taken from poledancedictionary.com)

I'm still not entirely sure how I did it, but I did. It was something like leg up and round and then back and then round and then upside down and dangle.... 0_o Muscle memory is an amazing thing....makes up for my brain memory :p

There was lots of spinning and lots of trying to invert with a shoulder mount (I can now get my knees up- YAY!) which is amazing, but makes your core hurt for-EVER!

There were some normal inverts and some crucifix, there was even some thigh holding.

But what got me the most? Butterfly. Butterfly is my NEMESIS move. I can't even explain why I don't like it, but I've always been scared of it. Well, I decided that I am not going to allow such a pretty and simply move to have such thrall over me. I was going to do it and I was going to do it WELL. Plus Tom and Karen made me do it...

I can't say it's my fave move, but Butterfly has been relegated from NEMESIS to just plain "ICK".

Pole has taught me a lot of things about myself and about dealing with the world and one of the most important things is to put fear to one side and do the things you love. Just not butterfly. I don't love butterfly :p

The final thing I did, which may have been ill-informed and definitely was best left till last was this...

It's a dart!

A bit of a wonky dart, but a dart none-the-less!

And with the dart I will wrap up my tale of bruises, stitches, pole dancing and road side theatrics and leave you with one thing I saw shared around today.

It's a short one tonight folks, Monday hasn't treated me too well so I'm going to run a hot bath and sulk in style ;)

This weekend consisted of lots of yoga, relaxing and Sunday afternoon wrapped in my duvet watching films. Bliss! My shoulder is healing well and that nasty chest infection has started to move - now I just need to sort my routine out.

You know when you take a lot of time off, things get all messed about. Well, I'm there right now. At the moment I'm getting LOTS of pole time in, which is awesome but aside from that I'm not doing much but yoga...how do you guys get back into a regular routine after injury time off?

Anyway, I'm glad to be back in the saddle. Exercise is my escapism and I've been forced to live in "real life" for far too long!!

So, what are my words of wisdom for y'all this Monday?

This one is something I need to remember this week! I don't know about you, but I feel like I sort of fall apart when I can't get my regular workout routine going - anyone else feel that?

So often in life we're tested to our maximum, it feels like we're cracking, ready to break apart with the slightest breath of wind but we're stronger than we give ourselves credit for. The human psyche is much more flexible and robust than we'd ever give it credit for. We are MADE TO SURVIVE. And we will - whatever the circumstances, you will pull through and carry on. Those moments of deepest despair only serve to let us know what the sweetness of life's highs actually feel like.

You might be cracked, maybe you're showing some signs of wear - but that only means that you have lived, you've made it through and you're ready to experience all of the amazing things life has to offer.

Always remember - YOU create your circumstances, YOU are responsible for the choices you make and YOU will reap the benefits of the seeds you sow.

I seem to have missed you all yesterday (again!) so I'll have to make a Saturday "feel good" post xD

So, what have I been up to this week? Oh well my lovelies, you'd be asking me a very (un)exciting question! I have spent a large majority of the week either marking, or sulking because I was in pain. As I'm sure you all would agree, pain = no workouts = grumpy person!

Anyway, I took myself off to a lovely sports masseuse on Wednesday (a lovely lady colleague of mine) who tortured me for around 90 minutes and when I left....I had FULL ROTATION IN MY SHOULDER! Woooo! (Well, full rotation for me....apparently my shoulders are NOT bendy!). I love sports massage. Whilst you're there you have to remind yourself why you're letting someone do this to you, but as you leave you LOVE that person!

So, this lovely lady is in the process of setting up her business for personal training and massage has asked that if I liked what she did for me (which I did) I should give her as many shout outs as possible (which this is). If you're local to the Crawley area and are looking for a good massage, give me a poke on Diary of a Pole Addict, or via email at diaryofapoleaddict@hotmail.com and I will send you back her contact details (plus I'm sure you'll get a pretty good rate if you say I sent you!). I'm waiting for her to set up a Facebook page so I can link that in ;) *cough* do it Kerrie-Anne *cough*

I feel at this point, in the interest of full disclosure I should let you all know I may get free massages from any business I drum up, but I'm sure you'd love to supplement my workout habits in such a way xD

The jokes about how much business Kerrie-Anne will be getting from me have already started - I would imagine she will be in constant employment given my track record :P (I may need all of my readers to get a massage with Kerrie-Anne just to keep me active ;)).

After my lovely sports massage, I then spent about 4 hours in the next two consecutive days pole-ing. I had time to make up peoples.....and my shoulder is still intact (not sure about the other shoulder now though, given I'd been pole-ing back to front for a while....).

So, Tom and I have spent about 4 hours now putting together a routine for our grading that is coming up in November. It's awesome fun - I'm torn between choices for music though.....there's either Tainted Love (Marylin Manson), Careless Whisper (Seether) or of course You Can Leave Your Hat On (Joe Cocker). Such choice....any preferences from my readers out there? :D

We've not got much so far in the way of routine, so I'll save you from the routine at this point but I HAVE finally got the hang of a body-swerve xD (since I don't generally "do" sexy it's taken a while, haha).

Anyway, I'll get more pole hours in and hopefully this shoulder will be as strong as it ever was xD I *might* avoid benching for a while though ;)

This week has been a roller-coaster of emotion, not being able to exercise is a big thing for me - as I'm sure it is for a lot of my lovely readers out there and I don't cope well with it. I use exercise as a way of modulating my mood and behaviour and it can be a struggle when I'm laid off from working out, but as I said on Monday - life is EXACTLY what you make it. So what did I make of my life this week?

Well.

Monday I had lots of fun lessons. I also got 90 minutes of pole into it. Granted I may have had a mishap that took me out for a couple of days (it had to happen eventually, that shoulder was just hanging on by a thread!), but it was still pole time xD (and we found the spinny poles.....such fun!)Tuesday I got some marking done!Wednesday I found out about Kerrie-Anne's amazing talents. I also discovered an online "sports nutrition course" that I will be completing in my own time. It's a level 5 certificate, meaning I'll come out of it with a diploma in sports nutrition - I'm SO super excited, and I'll be sharing my knowledge as we go :) (you will be my guinea pigs ;) ).Thursday I got MORE marking done, felt the burn at pilates AND discovered I could "do" sexy at pole. Our gorgeous instructor Charlie also let us hang around a bit longer than we should have to keep working on our routine. Love you lots Charlie xDAnd Friday? Well, Friday I got ANOTHER hour of pole in. So on top of it being Friday, it was a SECOND pole day xD

I'm not going to say that this week was all roses and sunshine. Tuesday and Wednesday were PAINFUL. I had a particular "low" on Tuesday and ate VERY badly, but I remembered back to what I "preached" to you all on Monday; circumstances are what we make them. Yes things go wrong and yes, sometimes we feel like we've fallen so far from grace that we'd need a miracle to find out way again; but you always do find way your back if you WANT to and if you commit to YOURSELF and your own body.

So what went well for you this week? Can you think of three AMAZING things that happened to you?